Hollow: A Sequel to Trouble In My Mind
by Jack Lecter
Summary: CHAPTER FOUR NOW UP! Some Logan flashbacks, more Logan involvement to come.
1. Default Chapter

Hollow: The Sequel to Trouble In My Mind  
  
By The Shadower  
  
Chapter One  
  
Disclaimer: These characters belong to James Cameron and Charles Eglee and the idiots at Fox idiotic enough to cancel them.  
  
Rating: PG-13 for later chapters, this chapter PG.  
  
Archiving: I don't know what it is but I probably don't care if you do it.  
  
Feedback: Yes, I love it. It's probably more addictive than most street drugs.  
  
A/N: I know this one's kind of short, but it's only chapter one. I intend chapter two to be longer. If you haven't read my earlier fic, Trouble In My Mind, you should do so or you may not understand this. Basically, this is Max after an alternate version of Female Trouble in which Logan killed himself and she found the body.  
  
Summary: Max deals with Logan's death.  
  
Chapter One  
  
"Some sense in everyone, did not occur to you, wake up an empty shell, someone to crawl into, your days are pieced to dream, the blanket's still asleep, consuming every thought, till you uncover me, Could it BE, that I'm fading, far away, straight out of it."  
  
-Finger Eleven's Shudder  
  
"Max, girl, you need to get up."  
  
Max rolled over in bed. Cindy shook her but Max failed to respond.  
  
"Girl, you late to work again, Normal gonna fire your ass."  
  
Max sat up, and looked Cindy in the eye, suddenly intense.  
  
"I don't care," she said. "I just don't care anymore. Let Normal fire me, it's not like it matters."  
  
"Girl, you don't get up right now and it's gonna matter."  
  
Max didn't respond.  
  
One week later  
  
Max sat, her eyes vacant, staring at the microwave. The timer went out and Max retrieved her instant popcorn. She lifelessly put a piece into her mouth, moving slowly and clumsily.  
  
"You can't take much more of this, boo. Neither of us can."  
  
Max dully turned to the doorway, where Original Cindy was framed. Cindy thought her eyes flickered with something like life, but she could have been imagining it. Max slowly placed another piece of popcorn in her mouth. Then looked at the ragged old suitcase Cindy was carrying, as if noticing it for the first time, then spoke.  
  
"What's that?"  
  
Even her voice was dead, cold and unfeeling. Cindy looked at her eyes. The flicker was gone.  
  
"I'm leaving, boo. You're putting yourself through hell and dragging everyone around you down with you. Or leaving them behind, like at work. You know Sketchy still asks me about you? Wants to know if you sick or what. Normal says you fired and you ain't never coming back but he won't let anyone use your locker or throw away your file. You barely talk to me, even I don't know what's going on in your head these days."  
  
Max stared at her friend. There was sadness in her gaze, and concern too, and for a moment she was like the old Max. But when she spoke, her voice was as dull as ever.  
  
"If you want me to leave I'll go."  
  
Cindy shook her head.  
  
"Nah boo, this is your place, was your place long before I came. It's me who needs to be going. Take care of yourself."  
  
Cindy moved to hug Max, and Max hugged Cindy hard. When she pulled away Cindy almost thought she saw tears there, but they vanished. After all, Max didn't cry, wouldn't cry, during the day. At night she wept in her sleep, as Cindy lay in the next room, pretending not to hear.  
Now, Cindy gave Max a last sad wave, and then she was gone. Max was alone  
  
A/N: Let me know if you like it so I'll know if I should write more or not. I realize ML shippers may not love this piece but it's certainly an ML piece, just angst filled one. In my other fic, flashback, Logan is alive and that's also ML if angst ridden too. I intend to do some non- angst ridden ML eventually. 


	2. Chapter Two

Hollow: Sequel to Trouble In My Mind  
  
By The Shadower  
  
Chapter Two  
  
Rating: PG-13 for later chapters, this chapter only G.  
  
Spoilers: Pilot, and, in the loosest possible sense, BBWW  
  
Archiving: See previous chapter  
  
Feedback: Please. Anything as long as it's not completely unrelated. Both praise and flames welcomed, especially if you say what you're happy or upset about. Thanks!  
  
AN: Original D suggested I use flashbacks to give this piece more of an ML feel. Please let me know if I achieved that or if I need to make future flashbacks different and how.  
  
**I don't know why I came here. It's decaying, what's left of it. At first I think it's unrecognizable with all the decay, and everything taken by looters. But then I see something and it brings back a memory.  
  
That's the mirror, over there. He took me over there and showed me my own face and said it was the most beautiful face he'd ever seen. The frame is gone; I'm surprised the mirror itself is still here, with the glass intact. Eleven months ago I would have been already thinking about where I'd fix it. Now the thought of touching it, of going over there and standing where I stood before, turns my stomach. Logan's gone. It's not right the mirror should be here still.  
  
That table over there, that's where we played chess. The pieces are gone and one of the chairs but the table is still standing. I won every game and he took it with a smile on his face and challenged me to a new one, never once getting frustrated over losing so much. Now, I wish I'd let him win sometimes.  
  
On the mantle is a statue of the Egyptian goddess Bast. I can't believe it's still here. I broke in here to steal it nine months ago. That's when I first saw him, heard him do his cable hack and realized he was Eyes Only.  
  
That's when I first felt that pull, that magnetic hum drawing me to him. The hum never went away until the day he died, and I still feel it sometimes, when I forget.  
  
I come into the room where he died, where I find his body, and I freeze up inside. I can't move, I can't think, I just stand and stare. His wheelchair is still next to the desk, where he blew his brains out with a semi-automatic .45. Where I found his body.  
  
I hear a noise behind me and turn, startled. Bling is there, standing behind me.  
  
"I just came to move some of his stuff out. He didn't leave a will, so I figured I'd rent out the apartment. Didn't want the new tenants stumbling over Eyes Only equipment."  
  
He goes over to the chair and pulls it back from the drawer. He wheels it toward the exit. I let him get halfway across the room before I shout "LEAVE IT!"  
  
He looks at me questioningly.  
  
"Just leave it," I whisper, my voice soft and sad. I want it to be louder, more emphatic. I want him to understand how important this it, even though I don't even really understand it myself. But now my voice is breaking and I can't make it strong again, I can't get back the fury. Now all I have is tears.  
  
He looks at me a moment, then comes forward and puts his arms around me. We hold each other for a long time.**  
  
***  
  
Normal dipped his brush into the can of paint and painted over the last of the graffiti sprayed onto a Jam Pony locker. He came to the next one and paused, just staring at it. MAX was scratched into the paint. Normal stared at it in silence until a new employee approached him.  
  
"Hey, is this locker free?"  
  
From across the room Sketchy turned to watch. Normal glanced at the employee, then turned back to stare at the locker. After a long moment, he raised his brush and brought it down over MAX, removing it from the locker's surface.  
  
"Yes," he said, "It is."  
  
From across the room, Sketchy just watched as the new guy opened the locker and inserted his objects. Sketchy then turned and walked into one of the graffiti filled bathrooms. It was empty except for him. He leaned down over one of the sinks and ran his fingers over where MAX had been scratched in the porcelain.  
  
It was only then that he allowed himself to cry.  
  
AN: Hope the flashbacks are providing enough ML. Thanks to Original D for the helpful idea. Also, in no way am I trying to imply and foreshadow any kind of Max/Bling. Don't even know how I got that idea but it will NOT be presenting itself in my writing. I should be getting to Pollo Loco next chapter, I meant to do it this time but I got distracted. Next chapter I should also be back to my usual third person narrative. I just felt the scene in the apartment should come from Max's POV. Please review and let me know if this is good. 


	3. Chapter Three

Hollow: The Sequel to Trouble In My Mind  
  
By The Shadower  
  
Rating: PG-13 (1 use of the F-word, violence)  
  
Feedback: Thank you very much, I would appreciate it.  
  
Spoilers: Pollo Loco  
  
AN: I plan to move onto Hit A Sista Back after this. Let me know if it's good or if anyone has suggestions for ways to put in more ML flashbacks, I'd love to hear them.  
  
"You're spirit's so thin, there's nothing left to take! Without rhyme or reason, you point the other way! I don't need to watch as, you go down in flames! Been over and over and over again." -Finger Eleven's Thin Spirits  
  
The pager was loud in the empty apartment. It's beeping reached the bedroom, and woke Max. She sat up, and immediately wished she hadn't.  
  
She hadn't eaten in two days, and pangs of hunger were already invading her stomach. Funny, she thought, used to be she didn't sleep at all. Now it was all she did. Eat and sleep. Come back into the world for a few minutes to ingest food, and then leave again. Max, couldn't deal with reality, couldn't bear to think about anything anymore.  
  
It was a kind of living death, a constant sleep. Max wondered abstractly why she didn't just kill herself. An image of Logan flashed into her mind, slumped in the chair with a portion of his brain on the floor, his hand still pressing a gun to his lifeless temple. Max shook it off and looked at the pager.  
  
The number on the display was unfamiliar, but it really didn't matter. She needed food, which meant going outside, which meant passing the payphone in the alley behind her building. Max scraped some change off the floor, hopefully enough for a phone call, and shuffled to the door.  
  
"Max, this is Sebastian. I was a friend of Logan's."  
  
Max listened to the oddly distorted voice synthesizer. She had heard it once before, when Logan had been trying to remove the Red implant before it killed her. She forced the memory away.  
  
"What do you want? Why are you calling me?"  
  
"Logan told me some things about you initially and I thought you might be interested- a man was found with his neck snapped- the following barcode was apparently tattooed onto the back of his neck."  
  
Max listened to the barcode in silence. She felt something stirring underneath the numbness she'd worked so hard to create. A kind of sadness mixed with anger. Logan was dead, Ben was dead, where the fuck did it end?  
  
"Max," Sebastian said over the line "You still there?"  
  
Max nodded, then, realizing he couldn't see her, said, "Yeah, I'm here."  
  
"Good. Listen, I got the address of the morgue where his body is being held. You can say goodbye if you want."  
  
Max nodded again, this time to herself. She'd never gotten the chance to say goodbye to Logan. She would say goodbye to Ben. She listened as Sebastian rattled off the address.  
  
Max stood in the morgue, looking at the sheet. She was a little afraid to pull it back, afraid to see her dead brother's face. Slowly, she put her hand on the sheet and pulled. The sheet came away. It wasn't Ben.  
  
"Good, isn't it?"  
  
His voice came from the doorway. Even after ten years, Max knew it was Ben's.  
  
"I thought the barcode was a particularly nice touch. I tattooed it on myself, you know. Very delicate work."  
  
His smile reminded Max of that of a cat after having finally killed a much toyed with mouse. She shivered, then looked at him.  
  
He was normal looking, not exceptional in any regard. His hair was neatly combed. He was clean-shaven. His clothes were moderately expensive without being flashy. He was, altogether, not someone you would look at twice passing him on the street, unless you happened to notice his eyes. There was something in them, a darkness reaching out from his very soul. He took in her reaction, then smiled again.  
  
"Very delicate work," he repeated softly to himself. "But worth it. Fitting, in it's own odd way."  
  
Max stared at him in shock.  
  
"You did this?"  
  
He moved into the room. He seemed excited, enthusiastic somehow, almost like a jazzed-up kid.  
  
"Yes, Max, I did this. Don't tell me you don't remember the day we killed that man. As a unit, remember? Don't you treasure that memory?"  
  
"I've tried to forget."  
  
"But you can't, can you? And do you know why? Because it was the most exhilarating day of your life! And that was only a fraction of this joy! Do you know how it feels, Max, to hold life in your hands? Do you know the rush of pure love and belonging that comes when you feel a spine snapping apart in your hands? That's when she really accepts you, you know. The blue lady."  
  
"Ben, please don't do this. Don't ever do this again."  
  
"You just don't get it Max! You don't know how it feels! And I'll never stop, and you won't stop me. You're too sentimental. You could never hurt your own brother."  
  
Max's eyes were more alive than they'd been for months. She kicked him in his midsection. He stumbled backward a moment, surprised, then grinned and began to fight back in earnest. Finally she pushed him up against a wall, her hands around his throat.  
  
"Try it Max," he gasped. "Just once, try it with me. The blue lady will accept both of us! Just once, know what it's like to kill!"  
  
Max's eyes had gone dead again. They regarded him lifelessly. Then, coming to a decision, she pressed her thumbs to the base of his neck hard, and squeezed. His neck snapped, and he slumped to the floor. She stared at him numbly for a moment.  
  
"I don't get it Ben. You killed that man and god knows how many others for the feeling you get when you take a life. But I don't get anything anymore. I thought killing you might be the key to really feeling something again, but I was wrong. Because I can't feel anything, not ever again.  
  
AN: Tomorrow I might update Flashback or do something different. Please review. Let me know if you like the AU to this yet. Sorry there's no Jam Pony or Logan flashbacks this chapter. Maybe next chapter. Also, I know Max didn't meet Ben in the hospital but I couldn't remember this episode very well and it's AU. 


	4. Chapter Four

Hollow 

By The Shadower

Disclaimer: I don't own it.

Feedback: Of course.

AN:I know I haven't updated in a while, and I apologize for that. If I get enough reviews, I may update sooner next time.

Chapter Four

They come for her a month after she killed Ben.

It is easy, child's play really, and the only part of it that surprises her is that it has taken them this long to find her.

Lydecker is there, and she can feel his intense pleasure at her capture.

She can also feel a kind of disappointment from him, perhaps that she was so very easy to find.

Easy to find because she doesn't care anymore.

She is in Logan's apartment when they come, the only place she ever goes anymore.

She is limp as a rag doll as they drag her out and put her in the back of a truck.

And then, nothing. For hours there is nothing but the soft vibrating of the car, the hum of its engine.

She doesn't care.

She's in a place deep inside herself, a place where Logan lived and she can be happy.

And when the car stops and they drag her out, she feels nothing still. Not even as she is hauled deep within Manticore, to the place where reprogramming will begin.

She is dimly aware of the light in her eyes, of the clamps placed on her head.

And then it starts.

FlashLogan showing her the mirror in his apartment, his hand grazing her cheek with a tenderness that surprised her.

FlashLogan on the street, falling and clutching his stomach as unseen bullets, fired by an unseen shooter, plunged into him.

FlashLogan after he'd been betrayed by his former wife, outwardly calm but writhing with internal anguish only she could see

FlashLogan kissing her softly through the window of his car, eyes shining with unshed tears as he told her to go.

FlashLogan sitting at a table, his eyes glazing as her blood pumped into him.

FlashLogan walking with her on the beach, their feet bare.

FlashLogan in the chair again, telling her he'd see her later, her unable to shake the feeling that that was a lie.

FlashLogan, slumped over his desk, eyes dead and lifeless.

FlashLogan telling her that it was her fault he was dead, she should have stayed to be sure he was all right.

FlashLogan, his face rotting but his eyes full of hate and staring at her.

LoganLoganLogan

There is order.

Logic.

Serenity.

These things her mind knows, recognizes from a time long before, and clings to as though they are long-lost friends. But she also notices, almost at once, that something is missing.

There is no sense of purpose.

And then it comes, crackling over the speakers.

"X-5 452, you are immediately to be deployed on your next mission."

Mission. There it is. That's what she's supposed to be doing.

AN:I hope to include Logan more soon, perhaps in a surprising way. Now, please review.


End file.
